


bruised seas and bright skies

by skatzaa



Series: domestic Kendricks [2]
Category: The Scorpio Races - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Finn visits the mainland, Gen, Post-Canon, Post-The Scorpio Races, the Finnfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2016-12-22
Packaged: 2018-09-10 19:35:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8934205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skatzaa/pseuds/skatzaa
Summary: A year after Puck races and wins, I tell her, “I’m going to visit Gabe.” She blinks at me and starts to turn away. “On the mainland.”
   That gets her attention. (Or: the long awaited finnfic.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> For the wonderful welcometothisby, who is everything this fandom could ask for and more. Big thanks to ivecarvedawoodenheart for the quick beta read ^-^ Any mistakes, therefore, are mine.
> 
> This is much longer than I was expecting it to be.

FINN

A year after Puck races and wins, I tell her, “I’m going to visit Gabe.” She blinks at me and starts to turn away. We’re sitting in the kitchen, just the two of us. Sean is off somewhere else, and it’s almost like it used to be, except I can’t pretend Mum and Dad and Gabe are just out in Skarmouth. “On the mainland.” 

That gets her attention, as if she too tries to pretend he’s only away for a while, instead of gone. 

“What.” She doesn’t make it sound like a question, as if it never occurred to her to leave Thisby. Knowing my sister, it hasn’t.

“Just for a week or so,” I say, but it doesn’t make the terrible look on her face disappear. My stomach twists. “George Holly wrote me. He’ll be at the docks next Thursday to come to Thisby for the races. I’ll meet him there and take the ferry back with him.”

Puck turns her back to me and begins to pull out food for dinner. I’m thankful it’s not beans, but I also know it’s not the real reason she wants to hide her face.

“But what about the way there? You’ll be alone.”

I almost ask her to come with me, but the rigid line of her shoulders tells me her answer. I don’t think Puck could ever bear leaving the island, especially with Dove here, and Sean Kendrick now too.

Instead, I say, “I’ll be fine. The ferry is safe.”

Puck bangs a pot down on the stovetop.

“You don’t know that!” Her voice is just a little too sharp, a little too high. Gabe would’ve teased her about being hysterical. I know it’s the fear. I press my fingers into the table’s edge and watch the tips turn white. “It’s never safe, especially this time of the year. Not with the horses just starting to come out.”

“There hasn’t been a death on the ferry in thirty years,” I say, but now we’re both thinking of our parents, gone two years in just a few weeks, and it comes out shakier than I meant.

“That doesn’t mean it can’t happen.”

I look out the window and the gray, overcast sky. Thisby is my home and I love it, but I refuse to be trapped here by Puck’s fear and love. I want to see the mainland, and I want to see my brother.

“I’m going,” I say, and stand. I walk to the door and try not to notice the way Puck’s head bows over the stove, her wild hair covering her face.

*

The mainland is… not what I expected.

I step off the ferry two days after my conversation with Puck, bag slung over my shoulder, and immediately almost get run over by a clanking truck that stinks of fish. I vow not to tell Pick when I get home, because she’ll take it as a sign that she was right, and she’s always unbearably smug when that happens.

There are people everywhere: dockhands shouting at each other, fishermen emptying their nets, children running underfoot. The road is newly paved, still dark and smooth under my feet. The buildings are red brick, vibrant against the bruised sea and bright sky. I want to keep looking forever, but I don’t want to actually get hit, so I pull my gaze down.

It isn’t until I’ve walked for five minutes, dodging well-dressed mainlanders and grubby children alike, that I realize I don’t actually know where Gabe lives.

Puck is going to kill me.

I press my back against the brick exterior of a shop, which is as out of the way I can make myself right now, and allow myself thirty seconds to focus on the tightness in my chest. People pass by, unconcerned by anything other than their own lives, and I envy them for a moment.

Then, I push off from the brick and enter the building.

It’s a clothing shop, as far as I can tell, and nothing like Fathom and Sons, the only shop I’ve spent more than a few minutes in. The few customers are dressed as nicely as Benjamin Malvern, and seem about as nice.

I dig my fingers into the strap of my bag and wish I wasn’t wearing Gabe’s old sweater that will always be a bit too big. At least I took off the hat Puck made me wear once I got on the ferry.

A young woman approaches, and the pinched look on her face tells me everything I need to know of her opinion of me.

“Can I help you?” She asks, and her voice is vaguely pleasant in the way that most mainlanders’ are—soft and foreign and ultimately forgettable.

“I need to find my brother,” I say, then wish I hadn’t, because her smile could rival Puck’s worst glare. Two of the customers giggle behind their hands. My chest tightens. I try instead, “Is there a way that I can find his house?”

“Did you try the telephone book?”

I think I remember Elizabeth and Dory Maud once arguing over whether to get a telephone or not when I was very small; but, as Elizabeth said, on an island as small as Thisby, it’s probably easier to just track the person down. Either way, I’ve ever seen a telephone before. The purpose of a telephone book eludes me, but I press my lips together to keep from asking.

The women giggle again, louder this time.

The employee just looks faintly amused, but that’s almost worse, because it’s as if I’m not worth the effort of genuine emotion.

“Nevermind,” I say. I may not have Mum’s hair color but I still blush as badly as Puck does, just less often. I can feel my ears burn as I turn to leave. “I’ll figure it out.” Then, because my parents raised be to be polite, perhaps in the hope that I would counteract my sister, I add, “Thank you for your help.”

“Wait, young man,” a stern voice calls out. I look over my shoulder and see a woman about Dory Maud’s age, wearing a deep purple dress that I imagine is the height of mainland fashion. It looks impractical, and I can’t imagine any of Thisby’s women wearing it, at least not the ones that really love the island. Her face is angular in a way that isn’t unattractive, just unusual. Her dark eyes take in every detail of me, from my worn boots to the fraying collar of my sweater, and I fight not to shy from her gaze. “Are you from Thisby?”

I nod and she nods back, a short, sharp motion that reminds me of a horse testing its rider. She turns to the employee.

“I’m afraid I’ll have to finish our session on my next visit, Moira.” Moira glares at me, so I follow the woman out. At least she doesn’t look like she’ll like to feed me to a _capall_.

She keeps walking, and the crowd parts before her. It reminds me of the sure way Sean walks, the way my sister has learned to walk in the past year. It makes me like her a little more, whoever she is, that she knows a Thisby accent and is as undeniable as the incoming tide.

She leads me to a small, tidy-looking house that is nestles between two similar houses on the main road. I should probably be cautious about going into a stranger’s house, because if Puck was here she would be dragging me off by my collar. Then again, if Puck was here, I probably would know how to find Gabe already.

The house looks cozy, though, and my sweater is starting to itch, so I follow her through the front door.

*

Later, after I’ve changed into a soft blue sweater that actually fits and washed my hands in a bathroom that gleams with white porcelain, the woman sits me down at a dark, expensive looking table and places a bowl of soup before me. I glance up at her and she motions impatiently at the bowl, so I begin to eat. It’s good, and richer than anything I’ve had in the past two years. Puck and I do our best, but neither of us are particularly good at cooking—Puck because she becomes cross when things burn, which happens often, and myself because cooking is not as exact as baking.

When I’m halfway through the soup, the woman says, “You can call me Mrs. Greyson, or Helen, if you must.”

I swallow and look at her; she’s a severe woman, her dark eyes shrewd under stern eyebrows.

“Thank you for dinner, Mrs. Greyson,” I say. She nods approvingly.

“Now, about that brother of yours. What’s his name?”

I take another spoonful of soup right as she speaks, and try not to slurp it down in my haste to answer. Mrs. Greyson seems the type to value manners over speed.

“Gabe—Gabriel Connolly.” I sneak another spoonful, because it truly is delicious. “He came here with Beech Gratton, but I don’t know if they parted ways.”

Mrs. Greyson’s eyes widen, though I can’t tell if it’s from surprise or some other emotion.

“I wouldn’t have expected one of the Grattons to leave Thisby.” I shrug and eat some more, because she looks like she has more to say and I don’t want to stop her. “Do you know the Kendricks at all? Are they still on the island?”

I very carefully make sure there isn’t any soup on my spoon before I place it on the tablecloth. Mrs. Greyson refuses to meet my gaze. Her brow furrows as she fusses with the empty place setting in front of her.

“Sean is still there. Eoin has been dead for more than ten years.”

“Right,” she says briskly, as though she isn’t running her fingertips along the edge of the napkin over and over. “I expect it was the races, then?”

“That’s what Sean says.” She moves on to minutely straightening the silverware, but her hands are shaking, so they end up more crooked than they were before. I work on finishing my soup, not sure if I should continue talking or not. By the time the bowl is empty, her hands are steady again.

“Right,” Mrs. Greyson repeats. “Let’s find your brother.”

*

The telephone book, Mrs. Greyson explains, is just a book with telephone numbers in it. I feel my ears burn again, because it seems so simple in hindsight.

Gabe’s name isn’t in the book, but Beech’s is. I sit in a tidy family room as Mrs. Greyson calls the number. Her no-nonsense voice floats in from the other room, and I wonder if she would let me try the telephone, but when she comes back, I don’t ask. She hands me a piece of paper with an address on it.

“This is where he said your brother lives now, I can tell you how to get there in the morning.” She hesitates, and for a moment it seems like she’s going to ask something. Maybe about Sean, but I don’t know her well enough to be sure.

In the end, Mrs. Greyson only shakes her head and fetches a blanket, telling me I can sleep on the couch, once I take my boots off.

*

The next morning, Mrs. Greyson bustles me out of the house with breakfast-to-go in one hand and a rough map to Gabe’s place in the other.

I stand on her front step, thinking maybe Mrs. Greyson will say one last thing. When she stays silent, I take a bite of my breakfast and start down the stairs. Again, it tastes better than anything I’ve eaten since our parents died. My throat is too tight at the thought, and I struggle to swallow.

Then she says, “Mr. Connolly, wait.”

I look back over my shoulder at her, hoping there aren’t any crumbs on my face.

Mrs. Greyson is still standing in her doorway. Her red dress and dark hair make her face look especially pale. I watch the sharp angles of her face and wonder if she knew my mum or dad. I don’t remember them ever mentioning her, but I would have only been four or five when she left for the mainland.

All she says is, “Be careful, on your way to your brother’s house.”

I nod and then walk away.

The sound of the door closing seems louder than it should, more final, but I keep going. The city is somewhat less daunting with food and a map, but I still have to focus so as to count the turns correctly.

It isn’t noticeable at first, but the further I go from Mrs. Greyson’s house the dirtier the streets becomes. The buildings crowd together, and the clothes on the people I pass are more tattered than those who walk the wide, paved roads by the piers.

This is closer to the back alleys of Skarmouth and Hastoway that I grew up with, but on Thisby, I never feel threatened. On Thisby, people never eye me like I have something to give them, whether I want to or not. All I have in my bag is the hat Puck knitted for me and a few changes of clothes, but I hold it a bit closer anyway.

It takes me another ten minutes to find Gabe’s home, which is on the dirtiest, most crowded street so far. I can barely see the sky and the air smells like burning metal and too many people.

I only know which building to go to because a young boy tells me in exchange for the last of my breakfast. Mrs. Greyson wrote third floor, fourth door on her map, so I climb two sets of stairs and count four doors and knock.

And knock again.

No one answers.

From the moment I stepped off the ferry yesterday afternoon, nothing has gone the way I imagined it would. But I never thought Gabe wouldn’t be here to hug me and ruffle my hair and tell me I’ve grown taller in the past year.

I wish Puck was with me.

*

The hallway has been dark for a long while by the time someone vaguely Gabe shaped trudges down the way, though I don’t think the sun has fully set yet. The one window by the landing is so grimy hardly any light shines through, and since the buildings hang so far over the street, I doubt the sunset can be seen at all from here.

I’m sitting on the floor just to the right of the fourth door down, because it’s easier to be overlooked. It’s disgusting, but at least I can put my bag in my lap, pull my legs up, and hide my face in my knees, breathing in the smell of hay embedded in my clothes and pretending I’m home.

“Hey,” a rough voice says. I look up and see a more-or-less Gabe-shaped person, if Gabe was allowed a year to get even taller and broader. “I’ve told you, I don’t have anything extra to spare.”

The implications of that knocks all the air from my lungs. What happened to concerts and cars and oranges every day?

I stand and hold my bag in my hands. I ask, “Gabe?”

He draws closer, grabbing my face with gloved fingers. This close, even the low light can’t hide his too long ginger hair and a scruffy, overgrown beard. His voice cracks as he says, “Finn?”

I try to smile, but I don’t think he sees it, because he grips my shoulders and pulls me into a bone-crushing hug. My nose is squashed into his shoulder and there’s hair in my eyes. He doesn’t smell of fish. Gabe shudders and says, again, “Finn.”

He herds me into his apartment, one arm still wrapped around my back. I try not to stare, but there’s hardly any furniture. There certainly isn’t a radio, and I can’t imagine my older brother without music.

I can’t imagine Gabe without Tommy Falk or Beech Gratton either, and yet here he is.

“What are you doing here?” he asks. I pick at the sleeve of my sweater and try not to look at the thin mattress resting directly on the floor.

“I wanted to visit,” I say. I don’t say, I missed you, we both missed you, because I don’t want to hurt him with that and because I don’t think Puck would ever forgive me for telling him.

“How did you find me?”

I can’t tell, standing here in his empty, dilapidated apartment, if he feels guilty or not for never writing, but I tell him anyway: the ferry, my suspicions about Helen Greyson, her phone call to Beech. I don’t mention how I felt waiting in the dark, disgusting hallway for him to appear, or how all I want to do is wash my hands for a year. I let myself focus on the impulse for thirty seconds, and then lock it away.

We eat a lean dinner and talk about Thisby over his chipped and cracked bowls. Gabe doesn’t offer any information about his new life, other than it’s good I arrived today, because Sunday is his one day off of work, and I don’t ask. The skin on his fingertips is cracked and oozes bright red blood.

Gabe makes an effort to ask about Puck and Sean and the sisters, but he’s obviously exhausted, eyes drooping between questions, so I take the bowl from his hands and make him get into bed. He doesn’t even have a blanket. Gabe falls asleep in a moment, motionless in the way only the truly tired can be. His chest barely rises and falls with each breath.

I curl up on the floor and place my bag beneath my head, thankful that the clothes at least make it soft.

I think about our house, with its small, cozy yellow kitchen, the two abandoned bedrooms still full of our parents’ and Gabe’s things—well, my parents’ bedroom, and the other half of the room that is now solely mine. We didn’t sell much, or anything important, but I still remember the lean months before Puck won, our living room slowly emptying of furniture but none of us acknowledging it. Never the radio, nor Mum’s knick-knacks, though I’m sure Dory Maud would have bought them.

I think of how empty the house feels some days, when Puck has taken Dove to Malvern’s yard or Sean’s home by the cliffs. Eventually, she’ll be gone for good, and I’ll be left alone in the house we grew up in, one where there once was five.

I don’t want to end up like Gabe is in this moment: exhausted and alone and probably more than a little afraid. But there isn’t anyone to look at me the way Sean looks at Puck. No one would follow me to the ends of the earth, or at least to the mainland, like Beech followed Gabe. Like Tommy would have.

I turn onto my other side, close my eyes, and try to sleep.

*

We spend the next day together in his apartment, swapping stories about the past year, though Gabe doesn’t mention why he and Beech parted ways or how he ended up here. I tell him about the time Sean tried to ride Dove and she bucked him off, and the surprise colt George Holly will discover when he gets to the island, and the latest fight between Dory Maud and Elizabeth that made them the talk of Skarmouth for three days.

In return, Gabe tells me about the first concert he ever went to, and the girl he’s sweet on, and how strange and wonderful the mainland is. I can’t imagine liking a place so big and crowded, and yet, despite how little he seems to have, I can tell Gabe loves it here, more than he ever loved Thisby.

I think of last night and how raw and weary he was, and wonder which version of Gabe is true, now.

He laughs and launches into a story about the time he watched four grown men chase a little dog who had stolen one’s lunch. I don’t interrupt.

*

I spend the next three days wandering the city, seeing the place that stole my brother and others like him. It’s so different from Skarmouth, or the smaller Hastoway or Tholla.

Gabe leaves before dawn every morning, though he scratches a quick note on a scrap of paper the first day. It takes me almost an hour to parse out what all of the lines mean, but eventually I realize it’s a map. It’s more detailed than Mrs. Greyson’s was, and there are little tricks for navigating certain areas written in the margins, but that doesn’t change what it is. I shove the map in my pocket and find my way to sections of the city I didn’t walk through on my way to Gabe.

Everything is bigger and faster and louder, and certain areas smell strongly of smoke. I still can’t see the appeal. I wonder if George Holly’s America is anything like this; if it is, I can understand why he loves Thisby, but not why he went back to California.

More than anything, it’s lonely, wandering around a strange place without Puck or Gabe by my side.

In the evenings, Gabe only appears once the sun has nearly set. I help in any way I can, because I can see how much his hands hurt him, despite how he tries to hide it. We eat food that usually consists of beans, and then he falls asleep on his old mattress. My back is starting to hurt from sleeping on the floor, but I don’t say anything.

I want nothing more than to bring Gabe with me when I go home, but he won’t go. He loves the mainland, no matter how it has abused him. I wish I could change his mind.

*

The last day, I wake even before Gabe does and spend the time convincing myself that I shouldn’t bother asking. He can be as stubborn as Puck when he wants to be.

Gabe groans himself awake, in pain even when mostly asleep. Watching him, I feel old and helpless, though he’s nearly ten years my elder. Once he’s out of bed and dressed we hug for a long minute, and I don’t ask him to come home. Instead, I say, “You should come visit, next spring. Puck would like to see you.”

He doesn’t give a straight answer, but I can tell from the way he won’t meet my eyes that he won’t come back, even for a short time. I want to blame him, or hate him, or maybe curse at him like Puck would, but in the end I just hug him again.

Then he leaves, telling me to lock the door behind me. I have to sit with my head between my knees for a time because I’m overwhelmed by the feelings that rage in my chest. Eventually, I manage to stand and sling my bag over my shoulder, and then I leave, making sure to lock the door before I go.

Though I know it’s unlikely, I keep an eye out for Mrs. Greyson. I don’t see her even as I pass her house and move toward the streets near the pier. It’s probably good that I don’t, because I’m pretty sure I smell terrible. Around midday, I step into a deli and order a small sandwich with the few coins I found tucked into the bottom of my bag the day before. Once I finish eating, I duck into the bathroom and try to at least wash my face and hands. It’s difficult to not succumb to the urge to scrub at my hands, but I turn off the water before anyone can come to kick me out.

There’s still nearly three hours before the ferry departs, but I make my way to where the boat is docked and find a place to sit that’s mostly out of the way. I watch all of the people go about their days and wonder if any of them came from Thisby, if any of them left one pier simply to end up working at another just like it. If any of them miss the island.

With so many people working the sounds sort of blur together, and there’s something lulling about it. I’m somewhere between asleep and awake by the time I see a flash of white pants. Something about them strikes me as important. I sit up fully and see George Holly striding along the pier, hands in his pockets and a plaid monstrosity on his head. Slinging my bag over one shoulder, I stand and wait for him to spot me.

Something about George Holly—the way he walks like he hasn’t a care in the world, or maybe the way he smiles at everyone he meets—is incredibly reassuring. There’s no one with him and he only has one bag, and for a moment I wonder if he remembers how rich and important he’s supposed to be. Then he spots me, standing out of the way in the soft blue sweater Puck bought last year with the last of her winnings, and his smile gets even wider. It’s reflex to smile back, but I try not to on principle. Puck would laugh at me if she was here.

Holly makes his way toward me, sliding through the dockhands and fishermen and clanking trucks like all of the fuss is nothing to him. Up close, his hat is even uglier, but his smile is still kind.

“Finn Connolly!” He cries. We shake hands, and then he laughs and pulls me into a hug. I’m taller than him, now. Seeing him reminds me that Thisby is real and not just something I dreamed up on a hard floor in an unforgiving city, though he belongs more to this land than to us.

Holly shoos me toward the ferry, where we hand over our tickets, and directs me to a seat. He sits beside me, and I watch as the smile slips from his face. He asks, “How is your brother?”

I look at my hands; they’re clutching one strap of my bag, and yet it feels as though they don’t belong to me. Holly hms and nudges me gently with his shoulder, but doesn’t say anything else on the subject.

“What’s with the hat?” I don’t mean to ask, but he laughs at the question, so I don’t feel too bad.

“I thought it might be more similar to what you wear on the island.” He takes one look at my face and laughs even harder. “No? Too much? Ah, it was worth a try.”

I must fall asleep between quiet conversations, because the next I know, George Holly is jostling me awake and saying something that I don’t catch. As I rub the sleep from my eyes, I look up and see the fog and cliffs and grey sky I’ve lived with my whole life, and it feels like the first full breath I’ve taken since I left.

George Holly is considering me from the corner of his eye, so it’s not surprising when he says, “I find I’m famished for something from Palsson’s. Would you like something? My treat, of course.”

I nod and follow him into Skarmouth, trying not to laugh at how dirty his outfit gets and how little he seems to care.

Thisby hasn’t changed in the few days that I’ve been gone, and yet it feels as though I’m seeing it for the first time. Palsson’s is crowded with housewives who are avoiding their homes or husbands, as always, and Holly and I content ourselves to wait. I don’t particularly mind, since it smells wonderful, and it looks like George Holly feels the same way. The moment we step through the door, he inhales deeply and sighs. We stand quietly and wait for the line to move forward.

And then we hear someone say, “Did they say how he died?”

Her companion snorts and says, “more importantly, did they say who he named heir? The island runs on the buyers the yard brings in.”

A third person adds, “I didn’t hear, I came straight to tell you.”

The second woman says, “I’ll bet it was Kendrick, even with their falling out.”

Holly and I exchange a glance, his eyebrows raised in question.

I look around and spot Brigid, a girl I went to school with. I touch her elbow and ask, “Are they talking about Benjamin Malvern?”

Brigid looks up at me and smiles and nods. I nod back and turn to Holly, who gives me an amused look that I ignore.

“It’s Malvern.”

Holly whistles, but before he can say anything it’s our turn at the counter. Bev smiles at us, and it grows wider when Holly orders an absurd amount of November cakes and cinnamon twists. When she hands him the bag, she says, “That’s from the first batch of November cakes this year.”

George Holly gives her a charming smile and more than enough money to pay for his food. He doesn’t take the change, and I can already see women eyeing him as we exit the shop.

We step outside and Holly hands me two cinnamon twists and a November cake.

“There’s more, if you’d like,” he says, then bites into a November cake. I eat a cinnamon twist as he very obviously enjoys the cake. “Well, that changes my plans.”

I start on the second cinnamon twist and nearly choke on it when he adds, “I wonder how much I could buy the yard for.”

Once I stop coughing, I look at him. There’s mud all up his trouser legs and his hat is askew. 

Holly only knew me for a few days a year ago, and yet he wrote to me and bought food for us to share, just as he did last October.

Puck is going to be angry that I didn’t ask her first, but I think of empty bedrooms and empty houses and how Sean is going to try to catch a second _capall_ this year, and I say, “You can stay with us while you figure that out, if you’d like.”

Holly laughs in surprise and claps me on the back with a sticky hand. I try not to smile at him and take a bite of the November cake, which tastes sweeter than they ever have before.

**Author's Note:**

> George Holly is such a hard character to write.
> 
> I’ll admit, I was perhaps unduly inspired by Engels’ “Industrial Manchester, 1844” in regards to Gabe’s area of town, which is a little early for tsr, but I couldn’t help myself. This was a challenge in that the majority of the story wasn’t set on Thisby, but I still wanted to carry over the atmosphere of the island. Lemme know how I did? :p
> 
> Read On,  
> Skats


End file.
